Etikett: Theconversation.com

As a way to gather poetry from across a career, a “selected” is not as unwieldy or as final-sounding as a “complete” or “collected” edition. The even more popular “new and selected” helps old poems reach a new audience, while offering established readers some of the poet’s latest work.

As Jill Jones notes in her latest collection, Acrobat Music: New and Selected Poems, there are practical issues as well. Poetry volumes tend to go out of print and are unlikely to be digitised. A selected edition, then, is a way to raise poems out of oblivion, as much as it is a chance to demonstrate and reflect upon the development of the style and ongoing themes of a writer.

Review: The Other Side of Daylight: New and Selected Poems – David Brooks (University of Queensland Press) & Acrobat Music: New and Selected Poems – Jill Jones (Puncher and Wattmann)

When is the best time to release a selected edition? Jones published Screens Jets Heaven: New and Selected Poems way back in 2002. It gathered poetry from her earliest volumes, including the first, The Mask and the Jagged Star, which had been published by the New Zealand-based Hazard Press a decade earlier.

Jill Jones.
University of Queensland Press

Jones has now published 13 full-length poetry collections. Her contemporary David Brooks, who has recently released The Other Side of Daylight: New and Selected Poems, has published five, the earliest being The Cold Front in 1983. He has also been busy during the subsequent decades publishing four novels, four short fiction collections, and seven non-fiction volumes.

Jones and Brooks are both illustrious and award-winning writers, but they have also nurtured the community around them. Jones co-ran BlackWattle Press and the journal Cargo. Brooks is a former editor of the literary journal Southerly. Both have had jobs in academia, fostering subsequent generations of writers.

In The Other Side of Daylight, Brooks recalls the Canadian poet Mark Strand gifting him his personal copy of Ezra Pound’s Personae when another couldn’t be found. He notes how the generosity he experienced as an emergent writer was something he has tried to pass on.

The other side of daylight

Poetry has been at the core of Brooks’ writing, but it cannot be forced. In Golden Tongues, he notes:

four or fivein a rushand then nothing

[…]

you turn aroundand the words aren’t there.

He describes poems as

liferising out of nowhere,needing you for something – an errand – urgently.

In an interview, Brooks observed that the 20 year gap between his first and second poetry collections was due to the influence of Czeslaw Milosz, who made him reflect on how “to situate my lyrical impulses historically, politically and metaphysically”.

Poetic affinities are part of the weave of his work, from the echo of Rainer Maria Rilke’s phrase “the other side of nature” in the title of The Other Side of Daylight to the elegies for writer friends, such as the poet Richard Deutch.

David Brooks.
University of Queensland Press

Brooks’ most recent poems, which open the volume, evoke a sense of communion with one’s environment and fellow beings that comes with time. Many speak not only of animals’ sentience, but an empathetic community that contrasts with the violence and disregard humans show towards their environment and each other.

In Romanée-Conti, for example, the poet views the obscene price of a bottle of wine within a global economy of exploitation and suffering, concluding:

The saddest and most appalling thing is that although by nowit will probably taste like an old priest’s piss,the price sounds about right.

Another poem critiques kangaroo leather through the image of kangaroos leaping towards Boston and its famous marathon. At times, there is a sense of despair at the inability to make interventions, whether by poetry (“No one is listening to the poets,” Brooks writes in Farewell to the Long Sad Party) or by deed – as in Taralga Road, where the poet tries to rescue a joey from being one more roadkill statistic.

What becomes powerful is Brooks’ capacity to redress indifference by conveying the character of animals. An Invasion of Clouds depicts a study being overtaken by a small group of sheep:

the black one, turning his back,slowly and sensually rubs his behindon the literary theory section of the bookshelf.

The sheep leaves with a final pleasurable pee “on the just-washed floor”. As a metaphor of the limitations of literary criticism, it is glorious.

Brooks’ lyricism is deeply personal, even when he is reflecting on broader historical or global patterns. “Captain Hunter and the Petrels”, for instance, frames a story of colonial survival at the expense of a bird species through an account of Brooks buying books on his way to see the late Andrew Burke, the friend and fellow poet to whom The Other Side of Daylight is dedicated.

Reading back through the volume to earlier work, we can see how Brooks’ recent poems consolidate his past thinking, and how some are paeans to enduring love. We are provided with insights into animal grief and sociability, the latter found through different forms of language, as in Each Other’s Tongue, where both man and sheep

murmur about moonlight,for a brief moment.

Another earlier poem, Damage, seems to reflect on what it might mean to be on the “other side of daylight”:

damage is […] the gapbetween what we areand what we have been thinkingthat we could be.

There is the capacity “to think of life differently” and “always greater care to be taken”. Brooks concludes that

pain and error and regret are akind of light in themselves

and that

In the dark one can sometimes seeso much more clearly than in the day.

Acrobat music

By contrast, there is no deeper symbolism in many of Jones’ poems. In This Crumbling Aura, she states:

Sometimes the dark is just the way a room isor that part of a blink that flicker of closing.

While Brooks grounds the self in partners, animals, friends and the mountains, Jones is open to a mercurial form of the self and its many versions. Her poem The Beautiful Anxiety finds that anxiety arises from the fact there is “never time to know / yourself” when one is “moving”.

“Damage,” she adds, “seems almost a necessity.”

In Possible Manners of Revelation, Jones writes:

I deface all my damage because the world won’t forgive meI recite a history of my own breath, which is the poem.

This has something of a queer resilience to it. Feeling “blue” features frequently in Jones’ poetry, but she rejects the idea of sitting with it. Instead, she favours methodological wandering and intellectual curiosity. Her “acrobat music” flies with language and change.

She navigates the absurdities and reductions of urban living. As she declares in Leaving it to the Sky:

I don’t believe in fake tans, but I could. All around are little dogs. Hail, queens of suburbia! Every so often, it’s the age of beige.

She adds:

Do I lack an overarching narrative? […] give me Iced Vo-vos, cups of strong tea, and a work ethic.

The poem Wave transposes the weaving of cars in city traffic into a series of rearranged words, finding that “with numbers, each […] is beautiful [in] its own exhaust”.

Desire features in both Brooks’ and Jones’ poetry. Where much, though not all, of the desire in Brooks’ poetry is understood through the gaze, Jones focuses on the sass and bliss of bodily movement, which she calls “our thousand dances”. She describes

all of them olderall of them younger all nowstill lifting above the roof.

[…] in fabulous style […] with these two arms.

The “best of” feel of a selected edition might wield some canonical clout, but it can also flatten a diverse oeuvre. Jones notes that Acrobat Music contains none of her longer sequences or her more linguistically experimental poems.

Yet the volume still includes prose poems, braided poems, a poem called Difficult Poem, the Sapphic fragment Some ( ) Time, and the short but wonderful ekphrastic sequence Touches / Touches Us.

The omissions have not stopped Acrobat Music from being an exhilarating new ride through Jones’ work. She has deliberately sought to disrupt a sense of chronology by grouping poems across five clusters, with a sixth section of previously unpublished poems. As she notes, the company these poems now keep might be through sound or affect as much as thematic or formal connection.

Where Brooks and Jones intersect is their detailing of everyday and intimate life as a springboard for wider reflection. The work of both poets also draws attention to environmental changes. In Easter 2016, his revision of W.B. Yeats’ Easter 1916, Brooks implores Australian culture to stop its destructive practices. Jones, in her poem Disrepair, likens our situation to being in a leaking boat that requires caulking “we’ve no time to give”, listening to “more than half-silent scrapings of midnight”. In Hope for Whole, the title poem of a 2018 anthology speaking out against Adani, she nevertheless argues for a holistic hope.

Many of the prescient and memorable poems in these two new and selected volumes stay with you long after reading. In being selected rather than complete editions, we can look forward to more from both poets. As Jones concludes in her recent poem Gone In Terrain,

Nothing isever finished. Läs mer…

Who could have predicted that after nearly 14 years of civil war and five years of stalemate, the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria would collapse in just a week? With Assad’s departure, the pressing question now is what lies ahead for Syria’s immediate future.

When opposition fighters led by the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) seized the major city of Aleppo in late November with minimal resistance, commentators widely believed it marked the beginning of the Assad regime’s downfall. Many anticipated a bitter fight to the end.

Assad was caught off guard, and his forces were clearly unprepared. He withdrew his remaining troops from Aleppo to regroup and gain time for reinforcements to arrive from Russia and Iran, and hope the opposition fighters would stop there.

It wasn’t to be. Emboldened by their swift success in Aleppo, HTS fighters wasted no time and advanced on Hama, capturing it with ease. They quickly followed up by seizing Homs, the next major city to the south.

Russia provided limited air support to Assad. But Iran, having depleted its forces in Hezbollah’s defence against Israel in Lebanon, was unable to offer significant assistance and withdrew its remaining personnel from Syria. Meanwhile, Assad’s frantic calls for support from Iraq did not go anywhere.

Seeing the writing on the wall, the morale of Assad’s forces and leadership plummeted. Fearing retribution in the event of the regime’s collapse, defections began en masse, further accelerating Assad’s downfall.

And on the last day, Assad fled the country, and his prime minister officially handed over power to HTS and its leadership. It marked the end of 54 years of Assad family rule in Syria.

Opposition fighters tear up a huge portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo.
Mohammed Al-Rifai/EPA

The Assad legacy

The Assad family, including Bashar al-Assad and his father, Hafez al-Assad, will likely be remembered by the majority of Syrians as brutal dictators.

The modern state of Syria was established in 1920 following the Sykes-Picot Agreement in the aftermath of the first world war. Syria became a League of Nations mandate under French control, only gaining independence in 1944. Following a tumultuous period, including a failed unification with Egypt, the Ba’ath Party seized control in 1963 through a coup that involved Hafez al-Assad.

In 1966, Hafez al-Assad led another coup alongside other officers from the Alawite minority. This ultimately resulted in a civilian regime, with Hafez al-Assad becoming president in 1970.

Hafez al-Assad portrait, taken sometime before 1987.
Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons

Hafez al-Assad established himself as an authoritarian dictator, concentrating power, the military and the economy in the hands of his relatives and the Alawite community. Meanwhile, the Sunni majority was largely marginalised and excluded from positions of power and influence.

Hafez al-Assad is most infamously remembered for his brutal suppression of the opposition in 1982. The uprising, led by the Islamic Front, saw the opposition capture the city of Hama. In response, the Syrian army razed the city, leaving an estimated 10,000 to 40,000 civilians dead or disappeared and decisively crushing the rebellion.

Hafez al-Assad died in 2000, and, the least likely candidate, his younger son, Bashar al-Assad, assumed the presidency. Having been educated in the West to become a doctor, Bashar al-Assad projected a moderate and modern image, raising hopes he might usher in a new era of progress and democracy in Syria.

However, Bashar al-Assad soon found himself navigating a turbulent regional landscape following the September 11 2001 terror attacks and the US invasion of Iraq. In 2004, after the United States imposed sanctions on Syria, Assad sought closer ties with Turkey. He and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan became friends, removing visa requirements between their countries and making plans to establish economic zones to boost trade.

Erdoğan and Assad then had a falling out during a series of events in 2011, a year that marked a turning point for Syria. The Arab Spring revolts swept into the country, presenting Assad with a critical choice: to pursue a democratic path or crush the opposition as his father had done in 1982.

He chose the latter, missing a historic opportunity to peacefully transform Syria.

The consequences were catastrophic. A devastating civil war broke out, resulting in more than 300,000 deaths (some estimates are higher), 5.4 million refugees, and 6.9 million people internally displaced. This will be Assad’s legacy.

A man rides a bicycle through Homs, Syria, in 2014. The city was devastated by the country’s civil war.
Dusan Vranic/AP

Syria’s immediate challenges

Syria now has a new force in power: HTS and its leadership, spearheaded by the militant leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani. They will face immediate challenges and four key priorities:

1) Consolidating power. The new leadership will now try to ensure there are no armed groups capable of contesting their rule, particularly remnants of the old Assad regime and smaller factions that were not part of the opposition forces.

Critically, they will also need to discuss how power will be shared among the coalition of opposition groups. Al-Jolani is likely to become the founding president of the new Syria, but how the rest of the power will be distributed remains uncertain.

It seems the opposition was not prepared to take over the country so quickly, and they may not have a power-sharing agreement. This will need to be negotiated and worked out quickly.

The new government will likely recognise the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and the territories it controls as an autonomous region within Syria. An independent Kurdish state, however, will be strongly opposed by Turkey, the main external backer of the opposition.

Yet, history seems to be moving in favour of the Kurds. There is now the eventual possibility of an independent Kurdish state, potentially combining northern Iraq and northeastern Syria into a single entity.

Syrian-Kurdish children stand outside their tent at a refugee camp in Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border, in 2014..
Lefteris Pitarakis/AP

2) International recognition. Syria is a very complex and diverse place. As such, the new government can only be sustained if it gains international recognition.

The key players in this process are Turkey, the European Union, the United States and Israel (through the US). It is likely all of these entities will recognise the new government on the condition it forms a moderate administration, refrains from fighting the Kurdish YPG, and does not support Hezbollah or Hamas.

Given their unexpected success in toppling Assad so quickly, the opposition is likely to accept these conditions in exchange for aid and recognition.

3) Forming a new government. The question on everyone’s mind is what kind of political order the opposition forces will now establish. HTS and many of the groups in its coalition are Sunni Muslims, with HTS having origins linked to al-Qaeda. However, HTS broke away from the terror organisation in 2016 and shifted its focus exclusively to Syria as an opposition movement.

Nevertheless, we should not expect a democratic secular rule. The new government is also unlikely to resemble the ultra-conservative theocratic rule of the Taliban.

In his recent interview with CNN, al-Jolani made two key points. He indicated he and other leaders in the group have evolved in their outlook and Islamic understanding with age, suggesting the extreme views from their youth have moderated over time. He also emphasised the opposition would be tolerant of the freedoms and rights of religious and ethnic minority groups.

The specifics of how this will manifest remain unclear. The expectation is HTS will form a conservative government in which Islam plays a dominant role in shaping social policies and lawmaking.

On the economic and foreign policy fronts, the country’s new leaders are likely to be pragmatic, open to alliances with the regional and global powers that have supported them.

4) Rebuilding the country and maintaining unity. This is needed to prevent another civil war from erupting — this time among the winners.

A recent statement from HTS’s Political Affairs Department said the new Syria will focus on construction, progress and reconciliation. The new government aims to create positive conditions for displaced Syrians to return to their country, establish constructive relations with neighbouring countries and prioritise rebuilding the economy.

Syria and the broader Middle East have entered a new phase in their modern history. Time will tell how things will unfold, but one thing is certain: it will never be the same. Läs mer…

Who could have predicted that after nearly 14 years of civil war and five years of stalemate, the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria would collapse in just a week? With Assad’s departure, the pressing question now is what lies ahead for Syria’s immediate future.

When opposition fighters led by the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) seized the major city of Aleppo in late November with minimal resistance, commentators widely believed it marked the beginning of the Assad regime’s downfall. Many anticipated a bitter fight to the end.

Assad was caught off guard, and his forces were clearly unprepared. He withdrew his remaining troops from Aleppo to regroup and gain time for reinforcements to arrive from Russia and Iran, and hope the opposition fighters would stop there.

It wasn’t to be. Emboldened by their swift success in Aleppo, HTS fighters wasted no time and advanced on Hama, capturing it with ease. They quickly followed up by seizing Homs, the next major city to the south.

Russia provided limited air support to Assad. But Iran, having depleted its forces in Hezbollah’s defence against Israel in Lebanon, was unable to offer significant assistance and withdrew its remaining personnel from Syria. Meanwhile, Assad’s frantic calls for support from Iraq did not go anywhere.

Seeing the writing on the wall, the morale of Assad’s forces and leadership plummeted. Fearing retribution in the event of the regime’s collapse, defections began en masse, further accelerating Assad’s downfall.

And on the last day, Assad fled the country, and his prime minister officially handed over power to HTS and its leadership. It marked the end of 54 years of Assad family rule in Syria.

Opposition fighters tear up a huge portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo.
Mohammed Al-Rifai/EPA

The Assad legacy

The Assad family, including Bashar al-Assad and his father, Hafez al-Assad, will likely be remembered by the majority of Syrians as brutal dictators.

The modern state of Syria was established in 1920 following the Sykes-Picot Agreement in the aftermath of the first world war. Syria became a League of Nations mandate under French control, only gaining independence in 1944. Following a tumultuous period, including a failed unification with Egypt, the Ba’ath Party seized control in 1963 through a coup that involved Hafez al-Assad.

In 1966, Hafez al-Assad led another coup alongside other officers from the Alawite minority. This ultimately resulted in a civilian regime, with Hafez al-Assad becoming president in 1970.

Hafez al-Assad portrait, taken sometime before 1987.
Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons

Hafez al-Assad established himself as an authoritarian dictator, concentrating power, the military and the economy in the hands of his relatives and the Alawite community. Meanwhile, the Sunni majority was largely marginalised and excluded from positions of power and influence.

Hafez al-Assad is most infamously remembered for his brutal suppression of the opposition in 1982. The uprising, led by the Islamic Front, saw the opposition capture the city of Hama. In response, the Syrian army razed the city, leaving an estimated 10,000 to 40,000 civilians dead or disappeared and decisively crushing the rebellion.

Hafez al-Assad died in 2000, and, the least likely candidate, his younger son, Bashar al-Assad, assumed the presidency. Having been educated in the West to become a doctor, Bashar al-Assad projected a moderate and modern image, raising hopes he might usher in a new era of progress and democracy in Syria.

However, Bashar al-Assad soon found himself navigating a turbulent regional landscape following the September 11 2001 terror attacks and the US invasion of Iraq. In 2004, after the United States imposed sanctions on Syria, Assad sought closer ties with Turkey. He and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan became friends, removing visa requirements between their countries and making plans to establish economic zones to boost trade.

Erdoğan and Assad then had a falling out during a series of events in 2011, a year that marked a turning point for Syria. The Arab Spring revolts swept into the country, presenting Assad with a critical choice: to pursue a democratic path or crush the opposition as his father had done in 1982.

He chose the latter, missing a historic opportunity to peacefully transform Syria.

The consequences were catastrophic. A devastating civil war broke out, resulting in more than 300,000 deaths (some estimates are higher), 5.4 million refugees, and 6.9 million people internally displaced. This will be Assad’s legacy.

A man rides a bicycle through Homs, Syria, in 2014. The city was devastated by the country’s civil war.
Dusan Vranic/AP

Syria’s immediate challenges

Syria now has a new force in power: HTS and its leadership, spearheaded by the militant leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani. They will face immediate challenges and four key priorities:

1) Consolidating power. The new leadership will now try to ensure there are no armed groups capable of contesting their rule, particularly remnants of the old Assad regime and smaller factions that were not part of the opposition forces.

Critically, they will also need to discuss how power will be shared among the coalition of opposition groups. Al-Jolani is likely to become the founding president of the new Syria, but how the rest of the power will be distributed remains uncertain.

It seems the opposition was not prepared to take over the country so quickly, and they may not have a power-sharing agreement. This will need to be negotiated and worked out quickly.

The new government will likely recognise the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and the territories it controls as an autonomous region within Syria. An independent Kurdish state, however, will be strongly opposed by Turkey, the main external backer of the opposition.

Yet, history seems to be moving in favour of the Kurds. There is now the eventual possibility of an independent Kurdish state, potentially combining northern Iraq and northeastern Syria into a single entity.

Syrian-Kurdish children stand outside their tent at a refugee camp in Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border, in 2014..
Lefteris Pitarakis/AP

2) International recognition. Syria is a very complex and diverse place. As such, the new government can only be sustained if it gains international recognition.

The key players in this process are Turkey, the European Union, the United States and Israel (through the US). It is likely all of these entities will recognise the new government on the condition it forms a moderate administration, refrains from fighting the Kurdish YPG, and does not support Hezbollah or Hamas.

Given their unexpected success in toppling Assad so quickly, the opposition is likely to accept these conditions in exchange for aid and recognition.

3) Forming a new government. The question on everyone’s mind is what kind of political order the opposition forces will now establish. HTS and many of the groups in its coalition are Sunni Muslims, with HTS having origins linked to al-Qaeda. However, HTS broke away from the terror organisation in 2016 and shifted its focus exclusively to Syria as an opposition movement.

Nevertheless, we should not expect a democratic secular rule. The new government is also unlikely to resemble the ultra-conservative theocratic rule of the Taliban.

In his recent interview with CNN, al-Jolani made two key points. He indicated he and other leaders in the group have evolved in their outlook and Islamic understanding with age, suggesting the extreme views from their youth have moderated over time. He also emphasised the opposition would be tolerant of the freedoms and rights of religious and ethnic minority groups.

The specifics of how this will manifest remain unclear. The expectation is HTS will form a conservative government in which Islam plays a dominant role in shaping social policies and lawmaking.

On the economic and foreign policy fronts, the country’s new leaders are likely to be pragmatic, open to alliances with the regional and global powers that have supported them.

4) Rebuilding the country and maintaining unity. This is needed to prevent another civil war from erupting — this time among the winners.

A recent statement from HTS’s Political Affairs Department said the new Syria will focus on construction, progress and reconciliation. The new government aims to create positive conditions for displaced Syrians to return to their country, establish constructive relations with neighbouring countries and prioritise rebuilding the economy.

Syria and the broader Middle East have entered a new phase in their modern history. Time will tell how things will unfold, but one thing is certain: it will never be the same. Läs mer…

Giant old trees are survivors. But their size and age do not protect them against everything. They face threats such as logging or intensifying drought and fire as the climate changes.

Tasmania has long been home to plants ancient and giant. One rare shrub, King’s lomatia (Lomatia tasmanica), has been cloning itself for at least 43,000 years.

But in recent years, even some giants have succumbed. The devastating 2019 Southern Tasmanian fires killed at least 17 of the largest trees. That included the largest blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus) ever measured, the 82 metre high Strong Girl.

But giants still exist. In southern Tasmania’s Valley of the Giants (Styx Valley), there is a mountain ash (Eucalyptus regnans) named Centurion now over 100m tall. Centurion is a leading candidate for the tallest flowering plant on Earth and the tallest tree in the Southern Hemisphere. (California’s coastal redwood ‘Hyperion’ reaches 116 metres, but is a non-flowering tree).

For years, I have been drawn to Centurion as a botanical science landmark. I have climbed it, measured it, and observed it carefully. But after the 2019 fires, my colleagues and I realised the urgency of preserving physical genetic samples before the chance was lost forever. During the 2019 fires, Centurion itself narrowly escaped death. It was saved only by the efforts of firefighters.

Our recent research sequencing a high-resolution genome of Centurion turned up an intriguing finding – this giant shows greater genetic diversity than we had expected, which may boost the adaptability of the species. Finding and preserving samples of Australia’s other remaining giants will help scientists learn from these remarkable trees.

Centurion is the tallest known flowering tree.
Luke O’Brien, Author provided (no reuse)

Where Centurion stands

Giant trees are found only in a few locations in Australia, such as Victoria’s Central Highlands (mountain ash) and Western Australia’s southwest forests (red tingle, Eucalyptus jacksonii). These regions tend to have higher rainfall and less frequent fires.

Centurion is named for its height, at more than 100 metres high. But it is also at least three centuries old.

It has been lucky to survive this far. Centurion stands in a small patch of uncut state forest in a heavily logged area. Logging in the region is continuing, though nearby areas of old growth forest were added to the World Heritage area in 2013.

It was found in 2008, when forestry workers analysing aerial laser scanning data identified the tree as a 99.76 m tall giant.

In 2018, I measured its height using laser ground measurement. The living top of the tree had grown to more than 100m in height.

When I climbed Centurion, I saw the uppermost branches had actually sprouted from the side of a snapped upper stem about 90m tall. This suggests the tree could have once been significantly taller.

Branches resprouting from the lower trunk suggest the tree is taking advantage of a change in light conditions after neighbouring trees died. The resprouting abilities of Eucalyptus species mean these trees can better recover after fire – and outcompete less resilient species such as rainforest plants.

When the fires came

Strong Girl was the largest known blue gum. It perished in Tasmania’s 2019 fires.

In early 2019, I had planned to collect leaf samples from Centurion for deeper study, alongside geneticists from two universities. But then the fires came. Large tracts of southern Tasmania burned over that summer. Giants turned to charcoal. Centurion was left charred, but with a green, growing top.

After the fires burned out, we were able to collect samples from Centurion and began analysing its genetic code in the lab. My colleagues and I have now posted its genome to an open-access public server for wider use.

We used cutting-edge methods to create one of the best genetic fingerprints of a forest tree so far. It’s the first time we have documented an individual Eucalyptus including genetic contributions from both parent plants across the full length of the chromosomes. This totals nearly a billion DNA base pairs – individual “bits” of genetic information.

Centurion’s genome showed us the tree’s parents had each bequeathed it very different genetic sequences. This combination may have contributed to its extreme growth, though we don’t know for sure.

The genome reveals a surprising amount of genetic variation. In Centurion’s DNA lie new genetic sequences, deleted genes and duplicated genes. These variations suggest mountain ash trees have high adaptability. Not all trees are like this – some have very little genetic variation, or even rely on cloning. Trees bred for agriculture or forestry tend to have low genetic diversity.

Read more:
Where the old things are: Australia’s most ancient trees

Building an archive of giant eucalypts

After the 2019 fires turned some of Australia’s largest trees to ash, my colleagues and I realised the moment was urgent. If we didn’t preserve the genes of these trees, they could be lost forever.

The Strong Girl giant tree is now charred wood. Pictured: The late Derek McIntosh of the National Register of Big Trees.

The Tasmanian Herbarium now hosts our project to curate and store samples through the Giant Eucalyptus Specimen Archive project. We have sampled several of the largest remaining giants in the Styx Valley, lodging samples with the Herbarium and genomic researchers at the Australian National University.

The Tasmanian Herbarium is now preserving specimens of giant Eucalypts.
Daniel Bar-Ness, Author provided (no reuse)

Conservation – of specimens?

Mountain ash like cool, wet mountains. But as the world warms, drought and fire become more common. Recent Tasmanian bushfires have burned traditionally cooler, wetter parts of Tasmania, where rare species such as pencil pines and King Billy Pines grow.

Conserving old growth forests and their giants in national parks or World Heritage listing can only go so far in the face of these threats. This year, we have seen widespread browning and dying among eucalypts.

Preserving leaf and flower specimens costs a fraction of what it takes to keep living plants or store frozen seeds.

Future scientists may find these giant trees have some genetic talent for survival, as demonstrated by their longevity. Preserving their genes could help the species survive.

We may well need long-term preservation of specimens in Herbariums, which preserve plant material for decades or even centuries. Museums, botanical gardens, seedbanks and laboratories can also archive specimens from significant individual plants.

If the genetic stories of Earth’s ancient and giant trees are to be read in the future, we must take the time to record them and keep them safe.

Acknowledgements: Thank you to the Borevitz Lab (ANU), the Tasmanian Herbarium, and the Eucalypt Genetics Group (UTAS). This article is in memory of Tasmanian ecologist Dr Jamie Kirkpatrick (1946-2024) Läs mer…

A national Newspoll, conducted December 2–6 from a sample of 1,258, had a 50–50 tie, a one-point gain for Labor since the previous Newspoll in early November. Primary votes were 39% Coalition (down one), 33% Labor (steady), 11% Greens (steady), 7% One Nation (up two) and 10% for all Others (down one).

The primary vote changes don’t suggest a two-party gain for Labor from the previous Newspoll, but the previous two Newspolls probably had Labor’s two-party estimate rounded down.

Anthony Albanese’s net approval was up one point to -14, with 54% dissatisfied and 40% satisfied. Peter Dutton’s net approval slid one point to -12. Albanese led Dutton as better PM by 45–38 (45–41 previously).

Here is the graph of Albanese’s net approval in Newspoll. The plus signs are the Newspoll data points and a trend line has been fitted. The last three Newspolls have all had Albanese below -10 net approval, so the trend line is going down.

Albanese Newspoll ratings.

While Newspoll had a slight improvement for Labor, the Resolve poll below was Labor’s worst this term, and other recent polls have been poor for them. A key finding from Resolve was that by 59–13 voters said they were worse off rather than better off since the last election.

Labor’s worst Resolve poll this term

A national Resolve poll for Nine newspapers, conducted December 4–8 from a sample of 1,604, gave the Coalition a 51–49 lead by 2022 election preference flows, a one-point gain for the Coalition from the November Resolve poll estimate. This is Labor’s worst result in Resolve this term.

Primary votes were 38% Coalition (down one), 27% Labor (down three), 12% Greens (up one), 7% One Nation (up two), 11% independents (steady) and 5% others (up one).

Albanese’s net approval slumped 12 points to -26, with 57% rating him poor and 31% good. Dutton’s net approval dropped seven points to -2. Albanese and Dutton were tied as preferred PM 35–35 (a 37–37 tie in November).

By 59–13, respondents said they were worse off rather than better off since the 2022 election with 28% about the same. By 36–27, they thought the Coalition and Dutton were more likely to make them better off in the next three years than Labor and Albanese. By 56–21, they thought Labor did not have their back.

The Liberals led Labor by 41–23 on economic management (41–27 in November). On keeping the cost of living low, the Liberals led by 38–22, a big swing in their favour from 35–28 previously.

Resolve was taken after GDP figures were released last Wednesday. Negative media coverage of these figures may have affected voting intentions.

In additional questions from the November Resolve poll, voters supported the HECS funding changes that the government announced by 54–27. On university fees, 45% wanted them reduced with subsidies or caps, 26% wanted them completely scrapped and 19% kept the same.

Essential poll: Coalition regains lead

A national Essential poll, conducted November 27 to December 1 from a sample of 1,123, gave the Coalition a 48–47 lead including undecided (48–47 to Labor in mid-November). Primary votes were 35% Coalition (steady), 32% Labor (up two), 11% Greens (down two), 8% One Nation (up one), 1% UAP (down one), 9% for all Others (up one) and 5% undecided (steady).

The primary votes suggest little two-party change from mid-November, but respondent preferences were stronger for the Coalition.

The government was rated poor by 54–20 on increasing the amount of affordable housing, but good by 39–28 on protecting children on social media.

Over 75% thought Australia was free on religious freedom, freedom of association (right to join a union), freedom to access an abortion, freedom to protest and freedom of speech. Voters thought we had freedom from surveillance by 56–34.

Morgan poll and GDP figures

A national Morgan poll, conducted November 25 to December 1 from a sample of 1,666, gave the Coalition a 51–49 lead, a two-point gain for the Coalition since the November 18–24 Morgan poll.

Primary votes were 38.5% Coalition (up 1.5), 30% Labor (down 1.5), 12.5% Greens (steady), 6.5% One Nation (steady), 8.5% independents (steady) and 4% others (steady).

The headline figure uses respondent preferences. If preferences were allocated using 2022 election flows, there would be a 50–50 tie, a 1.5-point gain for the Coalition.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported last Wednesday that GDP grew 0.3% in the September quarter, up from 0.2% in the June quarter. In the 12 months to September, GDP increased 0.8%, its lowest since the COVID recession in 2020.

The household savings ratio improved 0.8% since June to 3.2%, implying that people were saving money from real wage growth and the stage three tax cuts, rather than spending it.

MRP poll: Coalition would win more seats than Labor

A national Multilevel Regression with Post-stratification (MRP) poll was jointly conducted by Redbridge and Accent Research from October 29 to November 20 from a sample of 4,909. MRP use modelling to estimate the outcomes of individual seats.

This MRP poll estimated the Coalition would win 64–78 of the 150 House of Representatives seats if an election had been held in November, with Labor winning 59–71. The Coalition would have an 82% chance of winning more seats than Labor, but only a 2% chance of winning the 76 seats needed for a majority.

In the first wave of this MRP poll, taken from February to May, Labor led the Coalition in a point estimate of seats by 78–56, but their lead dropped to 71–66 in August and now the Coalition has a 71–65 seat lead. Substantial swings to the Coalition in regional and outer suburban seats are driving its gains.

In the MRP poll, the Tasmanian regional seat of Lyons was likely to be a Coalition gain from Labor. However, an EMRS poll of the five federal Tasmanian seats has Labor well ahead in Lyons, particularly with new candidate the former Tasmanian state Labor leader Rebecca White. This poll was reported by The Australian on Friday.

Redbridge Victorian and NSW polls

The Poll Bludger reported on December 2 that a Redbridge Victorian state poll, conducted November 6–20 from a sample of 920, gave the Coalition a 51–49 lead, unchanged since early October. Primary votes were 43% Coalition (up three), 30% Labor (steady), 14% Greens (up two) and 13% for all Others (down five).

A byelection in the Greens-held Victorian state seat of Prahran will occur in early 2025 after the resignation of Green MP Sam Hibbins. At the November 2022 state election, the Greens defeated the Liberals by 62.0–38.0 in Prahran from primary votes of 36.4% Greens, 31.1% Liberals and 26.6% Labor. Labor won’t contest the byelection.

A Redbridge New South Wales state poll, conducted November 6–20 from a sample of 1,088, gave Labor a 50.5–49.5 lead, implying a four-point gain for the Coalition since the March 2023 state election. Primary votes were 41% Coalition, 37% Labor, 9% Greens and 13% for all Others.

South Korean and French government crises

In South Korea, the conservative president declared martial law on Tuesday, but avoided been impeached. In France, President Emmanuel Macron’s PM was ousted in a parliamentary no-confidence motion. I covered these crises for The Poll Bludger on Sunday. Läs mer…

What can plants or animals do when faced with harsh conditions? Two options for survival seem most obvious: move elsewhere or adapt to their environment.

Some organisms have a third option. They can escape not through space but through time, by entering a dormant state until conditions improve.

As it turns out, dormancy may not only benefit the species who use it. In new research, we found that a propensity for dormancy may affect the balance of competition between species, and make it possible for more species to survive together when environments change.

What is dormancy?

Many organisms use dormancy as a survival strategy.

Bears hibernate in winter, for example, and many plants produce seeds in summer that lie dormant in soil over the cold months before sprouting in spring. In these examples, the organisms use dormancy to avoid a season where conditions are hard.

However, other organisms can remain inactive for decades, centuries, or even thousands of years.

The oldest known plant seeds to germinate are 2000-year-old seeds of a Judean date palm.

Even older plant material (though not seeds) has been brought back to life: placental floral tissue more than 31,000 years old, found in an ice age squirrel burrow.

In our research we focus on a particular kind of dormancy in animals called diapause, in which organisms reduce their metabolic activity and resist changes in environmental conditions. Here, animals usually do not eat or move much.

Does dormancy protect species from extinction?

In theory, dormancy can allow species to escape hostile conditions. However, it has been difficult to directly link dormancy to the persistence of a given species.

We tried to make this link by means of experiments using a kind of nematode worm often found in soil called Caenorhabditis elegans. In these worms, the genetic pathway that affects dormancy is well understood.

C. elegans and C. briggsae worms under the microscope.
Natalie Jones, CC BY

We looked at four groups of worms. The first group were genetically more inclined to enter dormancy, the second group were less inclined to enter dormancy, the third group were completely unable to enter a dormant state, and the fourth were ordinary wild-type worms with a medium propensity for dormancy.

We created an experiment where all these groups competed with a common competitor species – another worm called C. briggsae – for food in different environments.

Using data from these experiments, we then ran millions of computer simulations to determine whether one species would drive the other to extinction over the long term, or if they could coexist in different environmental conditions.

Dormancy and competition between species

We found that when species are more inclined to dormancy, competing species can coexist under a wider range of environmental conditions.

When we simulated fluctuating environmental conditions, species with a higher investment in dormancy were able to coexist with a competitor over a wider range of temperatures.

This outcome is what is predicted in theory, but it is an exciting result because the prediction has been difficult to test. The experimental system we used has great potential, and can be used to further explore the role of dormancy in species persistence.

Our results also raise an important question: will species that have a dormant form be more resilient to the huge environmental fluctuations the world is currently experiencing? Organisms that can avoid heatwaves and drought may well be more prepared for this era of unprecedented global change.

We hope to begin finding out in the next phase of our research: linking the dynamics we saw in the laboratory to dormancy in plants, animals and microbes in the real world. Läs mer…

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, released on December 9 1974, is a fascinating composite of both 1970s New Hollywood and the legacy of the women-centred melodrama of the 1930s and ‘40s.

It is now mostly remembered as an early film directed by Martin Scorsese. But it was actually a project initiated by its lead actor, Ellen Burstyn, fresh off a series of acclaimed films including The Last Picture Show (1971), The King of Marvin Gardens (1972) and The Exorcist (1973).

The film would go on to be a significant commercial success, earn Burstyn the Academy Award for Best Actress, and inspire a much less gritty and profane sitcom that would last for nine seasons and featured only one (male) member of the original cast.

A step toward Hollywood

The subsequent critical reputation of Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore is somewhat skewed by its status as an atypical Scorsese film.

The director had only made three features: Who’s That Knocking at My Door (1967), Boxcar Bertha (1972) and Mean Streets (1973). Largely working outside the mainstream, he already had a significant critical reputation as a chronicler of flawed urban ethnic masculinity.

It is also fascinating to hear, this early in his career, Scorsese reminisce about how conscious he was of his growing reputation and of not wanting to be pigeonholed into a particular mode of cinema. He actively embraced the opportunity to make his first true Hollywood film.

He also felt the need to reorientate his focus away from men – though they still appear prominently – and embrace a female-centred narrative. There was also an insistence on working with women in key creative roles, and Scorsese followed Burstyn’s lead in terms of adjusting the script, encouraging improvisation and the nuance of performance.

Although women do feature prominently in subsequent Scorsese films such as New York, New York (1977), The Age of Innocence (1993) and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), it can be argued Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore is Scorsese’s only narrative feature that centres on female experience.

It has been criticised for its overly mild feminism. But Burstyn was keen to make a movie that focused on the everyday pressures and desires of its carefully grounded female characters.

In the relatively inhospitable masculine terrain of New Hollywood, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore is an outlier.

Scorsese is most commonly talked about as an iconoclast. But a key element of his career has also seen him operate within the system and maintain a capacity to work on large budgets and projects.

His desire to work with technologies such as 3D, large streaming companies, and actors like Leonardo DiCaprio (one of the few truly bankable actors in 21st-century cinema) have their roots in Scorsese’s employment by Warner Bros on this project.

He even expressed excitement about using the old Columbia Pictures sound stages. Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore would allow him to fuse contemporary – arguably feminist – sensibilities with the kind of star “package” designed in earlier times for actors such as Bette Davis and Joan Crawford.

Scorsese constantly toggles between cinema’s present and past, seeing them as inextricably entwined.

The path not taken

The film follows Alice (Burstyn) and her son Tommy as they travel from New Mexico to Arizona in pursuit of her dream of becoming a singer. It is one of many road movies made during this era and provides a fascinating time-capsule portrait of the desert and often ugly urban landscapes it travels through.

Although her pursuit of a career bubbles beneath the surface, the story is more concerned with the men Alice encounters and the camaraderie she forges with her fellow waitresses in a restaurant (the inevitable focus of the subsequent sitcom).

There is nothing particularly new or groundbreaking about this, but the film is most memorable for the small, often idiosyncratic scenes between Alice and her son. For the surprising moments of kindness, hard-won connection and violence Alice encounters. For the genuinely offbeat performance by Jodie Foster as Tommy’s worldly young friend. The needle drop of particular songs on the soundtrack.

Kris Kristofferson also provides an uncommonly soulful, weathered and comparatively gentle representation of masculinity.

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore represents an important watershed in Scorsese’s career, and also a path not taken.

Although he has continued to work within and to the side of the mainstream, he has rarely produced a subsequent film with such warmth and sympathy for its central characters.

As a portrait of flawed humanity, it is miles away from his next feature, Taxi Driver (1976). After that, there was perhaps no turning back. Both for better and for worse. Läs mer…

You’ve got to hand it to the Nobel Prize in Literature committee: its citations are masterpieces of brevity and precision. Entire lifetimes of tireless, painstaking effort, thousands of pages written over decades, are summed up in a statement of around 20 words.

The work of Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk, the 2018 Nobel Laureate, is a case in point. The hallowed Swedish academy awarded her the prize “for a narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life”. That’s 18 words, if you’re counting.

These qualities are richly in evidence across her varied output, which includes not only the novels for which she is principally known, but short stories, poetry and non-fiction.

The Empusium – her first novel since The Books of Jacob, the 900-page opus that clinched her the Nobel – marks the latest instalment in this unique writer’s journey across boundaries, driven by her insatiable curiosity about the human condition and the physical world.

Review: The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story – Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones (Text Publishing)

The Empusium’s premise is both ingenious and intriguing. It is best summed up in the novel’s subtitle: “A health resort horror story.”

Taking as its departure point Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain (1924) – a canonical example of Mitteleuropean proto-existentialism – The Empusium is a deft new take on the novel of ideas and convalescence. It provides not only a feminist reworking of Mann’s themes, but a trip into the mythic and phantasmagorical, with a detour into murder mystery thrown in for good measure.

Olga Tokarczuk.
Ukasz Giza/Text Publishing

It is September 1913 and the young engineering student Mieczyslaw Wojnicz has just arrived at a sanitorium in Görbersdorf (then part of Germany, now in west Poland), where he is to be treated for tuberculosis.

Our hero stays in the quaint Guest House for Gentleman, situated high in the Silesian mountains and surrounded by deep forest. There he undergoes various cures and sits about drinking, sometimes to the point of semi-stupefaction, the magic-mushroom infused liqueur Schwärmerei, which he and the other guests are encouraged to imbibe in copious amounts.

It is the perfect scenario for Tokarzcuk’s narrative. She weaves together a complex tapestry of philosophical musings, misogynistic early 20th-century beliefs, and a mysterious series of bloody, ritualistic murders.

In keeping with the homosocial norms of the time, Wojnicz’s companions in convalescence are all men. Principal among them are a Catholic traditionalist named Longin Lukas, a social humanist named August August, and a theosophist named Walter Frommer. When the men aren’t getting sauced on Schwärmerei, undergoing their treatments, taking mountain walks, or tucking into generous meals of roast meat, salted herring and blackberry compote, they talk and talk.

Their musings often circle back to the topic of women, the discussions ranging greatly in their degree of chauvinism. It is usually the German Catholic who can be relied on to champion patriarchy at its regressive worst. “Woman,” Lukas opines, drawing on Darwin,

is like an evolutionary laggard. While man has gone on ahead and acquired new capabilities, woman has stayed in her old place and does not develop. This is why a woman is handicapped, incapable of coping on her own…

On and on it goes. Women are deemed public property because they bear children. Women have a duty to satisfy male desire because, if deprived of “the means of relief”, men would fall ill. Even the sanatorium’s doctor gets in on the act. According to Dr Semperweiss, mothers can be particularly dangerous, infecting their children “with excessive emotionality, which eventually leads to all sort of illnesses and feebleness of spirit”.

Woynicz, our sensitive, mild-mannered young hero, does not join in this chorus, and not only for reasons of a moderate temperament or illness. He also harbours a secret that puts him at odds with the norms of the time. His gentler masculinity offers welcome relief from all this pernicious hairy-chested posturing. It becomes evident in his friendship with the seriously ill art student Thilo, with whom he strikes up a caring, tender relationship – one that provides great comfort to Thilo as his condition becomes increasingly critical.

Horror and myth

The subtitle promises horror, but readers expecting a riff on contemporary gore will be disappointed. While there are some blood-and-guts moments – for example, the exploding duck-heart soup served up to Wojnicz in a country inn – Tokarczuk’s take on the horror genre is mainly in terms of atmospherics.

In a setting that is all mountains, deep forest and villages, she draws inspiration from sources reminiscent of Grimm’s fairy tales and medieval Gothic, with a dash of Grand Guignol and a bigger dash of Greek myth.

Tokarczuk excels at the creepy and the unsettling, as evidenced in the Tuntschi that Wojnicz stumbles upon in his solitary walks in the forest. The Tuntschi are female sex “puppets” assembled from forest debris by men who work in the woods. They make these doll-like figures with twigs, stones and leaves, complete with fully functioning nether regions fashioned from moss where they find sexual relief. According to legend, the mistreated dolls can come to life and seek revenge on their abusers.

The novel is populated by other mythical female entities, who pop up from time to time. They appear as an omniscient agency that watches the goings on in the sanatorium, though their relationship to the main action is ambiguous. As mystical beings, they bear witness to the machinations of poor misguided humanity from on high, but they intermittently crash the narrative, somewhat like the Eumenides (the Furies of ancient Greek myth) in T.S. Eliot’s play The Family Reunion. There is also a reference to the Empusa: the entity that gives the novel its title. This shapeshifting female figure with a leg of bronze, also drawn from Greek mythology, is referred to as a monster.

Taken together, these various female – sometimes beyond gendered – forces constitute an alternate realm, a world beyond the world, which looms in and out of view like a set of movable clues in a detective story. Tokarczuk seems to be suggesting they represent a kind of world-in-waiting, a vitalist dimension of human experience and potential that will only be liberated once we overcome our prejudices and learn to tolerate difference.

A fascinating duality

The novel’s multi-layered, multi-genre story is rendered in what is often first-rate prose. Tokarczuk displays a Nabokovian facility with language. Her writing is rich, yet also disciplined and restrained, full of striking imagery, inventive metaphors and poetic observations. Describing the main sanatorium building, she writes: “the sharp, pseudo-Gothic turrets reminded Wojnicz of a gramophone needle, extracting concealed sounds from the record of the sky.”

The novel’s setting is a place she knows well: Tokarczuk grew up in its vicinity. It shows in her vivid evocations of the sharpness of the mountain air, the light on the lakes, the earthy scent of the forest floor when her characters go hiking and mushroom picking.

The Empusium is a hard book to classify. That is part of its design and charm. Tokarczuk has stated that she is resistant to genre practices and categorisations, seeing them as complicit in the standardising effects of the publishing industry and barriers to creative expression. However we might read her attitude, it is clear she is determined to dismantle the guardrails of genre and to follow her own instincts.

Her quirky, ebullient imagination thrives in this environment of self-mandated risk-taking. Underlying her freewheeling approach is a clarity of vision, oriented towards social justice and compassion for humanity. The way she assembles disparate elements always has a purpose, both political and aesthetic. She is not an iconoclast for its own sake, but always seeks some higher understanding, some fresh new angle, on an issue of importance.

Above all, The Empusium abundantly demonstrates that there is a fascinating duality in Tokarczuk’s grasp of the world. Her sensibility values both mythos and logos, the liminal and the defined, the sharp focus and the blur. It helps that she is such an accomplished writer. In lesser hands, a novel constructed along these lines could easily fall apart. With one hand, Tokarczuk confidently guides the reader through the scenes and settings of her finely etched narrative; with the other, she gently ushers us into themes of near-cosmic indeterminacy, the main impetus driving the imagination of this vital, necessary writer. Läs mer…

A recent bushfire in Kadnook, western Victoria, which destroyed at least one property and burned more than 1,000 hectares of land, is being investigated due to suspicion it was deliberately lit.

This is not an isolated example. About 28% of bushfires in south-east Australia are deliberately lit. The figure rises to 40% if we’re only talking about fires with a known cause.

These figures are consistent with international trends and tell us preventing arson and unsafe fire behaviour alone could significantly reduce the number of bushfires.

Despite this, prevention of deliberately lit bushfires is mostly absent from emergency, public health and climate action plans.

These fires are devastating

Deliberately lit bushfires can spread rapidly and have devastating consequences. They often occur on the edge of urban areas close to populated places, where there are both dense vegetation and flammable structures.

We see a peak in bushfires during summer when hot temperatures, low rainfall, and dry conditions make fire a more potent threat.

Climate change, land management practices, and increased interaction between people and rural areas increase our vulnerability to fire and the risks associated with deliberate fires.

The royal commission into Victoria’s devastating Black Saturday fires in 2009 reported 173 people died and an additional 414 were injured. The commission concluded at least three of the 15 fires that caused (or had the potential to cause) the greatest harm were deliberately lit.

The commission concluded we need to better understand arson. It recommended research to improve how best to prevent arson and how to detect who’s at risk of offending.

Nearly 15 years on from Black Saturday, these recommendations have not been implemented. There is also very limited evidence globally about how to prevent both bushfire arson and deliberately lit fires more broadly (for instance, fires set to structures or vehicles).

After the Black Saturday fires we still don’t know enough about preventing deliberately lit fires.
FiledIMAGE/Shutterstock

Who lights these fires?

We know little about the characteristics and psychology of people who light bushfires or how to intervene to prevent these fires.

The little research we have suggests there is no one “profile” or “mindset” associated with deliberately lighting bushfires.

But there are some risk factors or vulnerabilities we see more commonly in people who light them. These include:

an interest or fascination with fire or fire paraphernalia. This could include an interest in watching fire, or a fascination with matches or the fire service
experiences of social isolation, including a lack of friends or intimate relationships
increased impulsivity
general antisocial behaviour, such as contact with the police, truanting or property damage
difficulties managing and expressing emotions
problems with being assertive.

However, most people with these vulnerabilities will never light a fire.

Research shows rates of mental illness are higher in people who set fires (including schizophrenia, mood and anxiety disorders, personality dysfunction, and substance use disorders). However, mental health symptoms are rarely a direct cause of firesetting. Instead, they appear to worsen existing vulnerabilities.

Why do people light these fires?

There are many, complex reasons why people light fires. Commonly reported drivers include: relieving boredom or creating excitement, gaining positive recognition for putting out a fire (they want to be seen as a hero), as a cry for help, or because they’re angry.

However, not everyone who lights a fire intends to cause serious damage or harm. In some cases, people may not be aware of the possible consequences of lighting a fire or that the fire may spread into a bushfire.

Knowing these kinds of facts about people who light bushfires is important. However, they don’t help us prevent people from lighting fires in the first place. This is because authorities don’t always know who sets the fires.

Not everyone who lights a fire intends to cause serious damage or harm.
Dmytro Sheremeta/Shutterstock

So how can we prevent this?

First, we can learn more about why people set fires more generally, particularly those who do not attract attention from authorities.

Research in the United States, United Kingdom and New Zealand has started to investigate those who set fires but don’t attract police attention. The aim is to identify ways to prevent people lighting fires in the first place, and support them so they don’t light more.

There is almost no research in Australia or internationally into the effects of community awareness, and prevention campaigns or targeted strategies to prevent firesetting, including bushfire arson, in higher risk groups.

We know slightly more about interventions to reduce repeat firesetting. Fire safety education programs delivered by fire and rescue services show some promise as an early intervention for children and adolescents who have already set a fire, particularly those motivated by curiosity, experimentation, or who are not aware of the consequences.

There is also some evidence suggesting specialist psychological interventions can be effective in reducing vulnerabilities associated with adult firesetting. Forensic or clinical psychologists typically deliver a combination of cognitive behavioural therapy (a type of talking therapy), skills building (such as building coping skills, emotion and impulse control, and reducing their interest in fire), and fire safety education.

However, availability of firesetting interventions is patchy both in Australia and internationally. Interventions that are available are also not always tailored to people with complex needs, such as those with significant emotional or behavioural problems or mental health needs. We also don’t know if these interventions lead to a long-term change in behaviour.

Climate change is making this urgent

The continued and escalating effects of climate change makes it more urgent than ever to address the problem of deliberate firesetting, including bushfire arson.

Failing to address deliberate firesetting will have significant long-term consequences for public health, human life and the environment.

But until funding is available for Australian arson research, identifying and helping people who are more likely to set fires will continue to be based on guesswork rather than evidence.

As we enter another summer of high fire danger, our failure to fund arson research should be at the forefront of everyone’s minds. Läs mer…

Rising homelessness across Australia is overwhelming the capacity of services to offer emergency help. New evidence in the Australian Homelessness Monitor 2024, released today, confirms homelessness has soared well above pre-pandemic levels in most parts of the country.

Complementing the report’s findings from a survey of local governments, a majority of homelessness services agencies also report “significantly increased” numbers of people seeking assistance over the past 12 months alone.

Much of this escalation likely reflects the sheer lack of rental homes available and the extraordinary rent inflation experienced across Australia since 2020. National median advertised rents have jumped 51% since March 2020. Even when adjusted for inflation, the increase is 29%.

A welcome increase in government investment in social housing offers the prospect of some limited relief in the next few years. However, as none of the recent spending commitments extends far into the future, and because they generally lack any evidence-based logic, there is a high risk this recovery will prove short-lived.

Agencies are feeling the strain

Recent market conditions have created a perfect storm for homelessness services agencies. In parallel with the rising need for crisis assistance, there is less scope to help clients into secure housing. Some 76% of services were finding it “much harder” to find suitable housing for clients in mid-2024 than a year earlier.

Agency monthly caseloads are up 12% since 2019–20. There’s also a big increase in the average time clients receive support: up by 44% in the five years to 2022–23. This has forced agencies to reduce intakes of new clients seeking help.

The sector has a backlog, causing agencies to struggle to meet demand. They have been triaging applications for help. This means giving priority to people who are already homeless rather than at risk of homelessness.

While justifiable in the circumstances, this damages agencies’ ability to prevent – as opposed to relieve – homelessness.

The rental market pressures fuelling this crisis have continued to intensify, well over two years after Australia’s post-COVID reopening.

These problems would have been even worse without “extraordinary” boosts to Commonwealth Rent Assistance sanctioned by Treasurer Jim Chalmers in 2023 and 2024. In combination with routine indexation, these have raised maximum payments by 45% since early 2022.

Rising homelessness has longer-term causes too

The housing market impacts of COVID-19 disruption have aggravated homelessness in the early 2020s. But it’s only the latest phase in a much longer-term trend. This is because the housing market drivers of the problem are not (only) cyclical but structural; that is, built into how the system operates.

Housing demand and market supply have been out of sync for decades. As a result, house prices have continued to increase faster than incomes. This puts home ownership increasingly out of reach for moderate income earners.

With the path from private renting to first home ownership increasingly obstructed, even for moderate to high income earners, overall demand for tenancies has grown. This inflates sector-wide rent prices, further reducing availability of rentals affordable for people on lower incomes.

These housing market dynamics have been an underlying driver of rising rental housing stress and homelessness since the 1990s.

All the while, these tendencies have been underpinned by key tax and other policy settings that inflate housing demand and restrict supply. The federal government’s promised National Housing and Homelessness Plan must acknowledge, analyse and reconsider these policy settings.

Governments have begun to respond

As the 2022 and 2020 editions of the Homelessness Monitor identified, signs of stepped-up engagement with homelessness as a policy priority began to emerge among governments as early as 2016 in states such as New South Wales and Victoria.

Then, in 2020, several states launched large-scale, widely welcomed pandemic emergency accommodation programs for people sleeping rough and others who were homeless.

More recently, in a notable policy reversal highlighted by our new research, both federal and state governments have pledged appreciable investment in long-term social housing.

Initially led by Victoria and Queensland, followed by the Commonwealth and NSW, this new investment should deliver around 60,000 new social homes by 2030, by far the sector’s largest influx of new stock this century.

At least for a few years in the late 2020s, the promised programs might halt – at least temporarily – the trend of social housing dwindling from over 6% of all homes in the 1990s to barely 4% today. Yet any gains will remain modest relative to the scale of unmet need. Referencing this, housing and homelessness advocates have called for social rental homes to form 10% of all housing.

Even so, we should see, at least for a few years, a marked uptick in scope to help people who are homeless into secure and affordable homes. This will be the result of a surge of newly-built social units supplementing existing homes being re-let. And for more of those helped in this way, these will be homes designed and built to modern standards.

Australia can still do much better

Problematically, though, these developments have come about through incremental and disconnected policymaking. Other than in Queensland, there has been a lack of any stated rationale, strategic framing or evidence-based scaling of social housing programs.

In most cases, there has been no explicit recognition or acknowledgement of the need to keep investing much more in social housing than in the recent past. This investment must be enough, at the very least, to prevent a resumption of sector decline. Ideally, it should cover an expansion of social housing in line with known long-term needs.

It would surely be logical to include a statement of aspiration along these lines in the government’s promised National Housing and Homelessness Plan.

We cannot measurably reduce and then prevent homelessness without reducing poverty and expanding access to secure and affordable homes. Just as the current situation has come about thanks to mistaken policy choices of the past, these are challenges that could be squarely addressed by course corrections today. Läs mer…